A lot of times when we Blacks talk about the system of white supremacy, we often talk about it as something that is located somewhere far away, and not present in the things we do on a daily basis in our homes and other personal person spaces.The truth is that we are as much a part of the system of white supremacy as it is a part of us.
A couple of days ago, a group of friends and I were talking about the impact of white dolls (Barbie to be exact) on the pysche of young Black girls,and how having white dolls as part of their childhood shapes not just their self-concept, but also how it shapes their perception of white people (especially how they must treat them).
There is however a similar socialisation for young Black boys.Like many young Black boys growing up in ekasi, I loved movies. We integrated the movies we watched on TV into the games we played on a daily basis. We would essentially reenact whatever movie we had watched and would go to the extent of fighting to be the sterring (lead character). In the majority of cases, the sterrings were white AmeriKKKan males, with the exception of Chinese movies.But we didn't quite know the difference between a Chinese or AmeriKKKan movie at the time.
All these sterrings we were fighting to emulate were portrayed as super- intelligent, innovative, invincible, smart and sexy. These are characters such as Rambo, Chuck Norris, Charles Branson, Terminator, Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Jean Claude Van Damme etc.Then on TV you had characters such as MyGyver,Michael Knight and the A- Team.
In the A-Team the leader and brains was Hannibal Smith and the strong but brainless was a Black guy called B.A aka Mr.T.Then there was also a genre of religious and historic movies with central figures such as Jesus, Noah, Moses, David, the Pharoahs, Julius Caeser, Napoleon etc. The same narrative applied here. The sterrings were mainly super-intelligent white males, and the Blacks played the inferior roles.
Today, this pro white- supremacist narrative is perpetuated through a new breed of white actors such as Nicholas Cage, Tom Cruise, Van Diesel, Brat Pitt, George Clooney, Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, Julia Roberts, Sandra Bullock, Angelina Jolie and even ‘our’ own Charlize Theron.
All of these movies were (and are) not just innocent or neutral forms of entertainment or art.They are an essential instrument in the perpetuation of white supremacy, through a phenomenon called cultural imperialism.These movies, like foreign religions, are a form of psychological warfare against Blacks that seeks to bury itself in the Black pysche-to the point where white people don't have to lift a finger in order to maintain their dominance over Blacks.
Through these movies (other forms of productions) white people have not just been able to capture the black mind, but they have decimated our pysche and souls to the point where we don't just instinctively embrace everything white without question-but we instinctively treat our own values, norms and institutions, with utter suspicion, mistrust and disdain.
As a response, we need to sustain existing progressive Black institutions and where necessary, build new ones to undo these centuries of psychological damage. One of the areas that we need to guard jealousy is the formal education and spiritual development of Black children and this means taking total control of the education and spiritual well being of Black children. However, the first institution we must reclaim and sustain-is the Black family.The Black family is our first line of defence and counter attack.
